Over the past decade, user handheld device deployment such as the iPhone® have grown rapidly (IPHONE is a registered trademark of Apple Computer Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.). These devices provide a networked general purpose computing platform in a small energy efficient package. Because of this incredible functionality, developers have been able to leverage the functionality into useful intuitive applications that improve the user's quality of life. Handheld devices now have become ubiquitous devices that are central to their user's world.
Implementations of navigation applications like Apple Maps offer locational and navigational information to the handheld device user. The accuracy, functionality, and usability of navigation applications have made them some of the most used applications on handheld device platforms.
However, barriers and limitations to a very desired use case, automobile navigation, persist. Handheld devices have relatively small screens that are difficult to view while maintaining the wide field of view for driving. Device mounts are often cumbersome and intrusive. Operating a vehicle while interacting with a handheld device is dangerous and illegal in some jurisdictions.
Past attempts at resolving these problems have involved interfaces to connect to head units in automobiles. The interfaces involved using wireless connections to present audio and video generated by the handheld device. Often the head units would simply mirror the screen of the handheld device, so the user would have a larger hands free view of the navigation application. However, this approach still can lead to the driver removing his visual focus from what is occurring in front of the car, and placing it on the head unit.